1. Move out of your parents' home
Obvious, really. It's even better if you manage to get on the property ladder.
2. Dye your hair/have an unwise haircut/shave your head
Often as part of an unwise identification with a particular style of music, such as punk, goth or Nu-metal.
3. Women: purchase your first pair of Manolo Blahnik or Jimmy Choo shoes. Men: purchase, then dispose of, some deeply unsuitable footwear
Cowboy boots, winkle pickers, brothel creepers ...
4. Lose a fight
After 30 you should be able to settle things amicably.
5. Attend a wedding/funeral of a contemporary
Both important reminders of the fleeting nature of time.
6. Start writing a novel/film script/slim volume of deeply embarrassing poetry ...
Which will haunt you from the bottom drawer.
7. Spend a night sleeping outside
Whether it's on a Greek beach, or in a London doorway after a particularly damaging night out.
8. Stay up for 48 hours
Believe me, you will never be able to do this after you've turned 30.
9. Have your heart broken
If this hasn't happened by the time you're 30, you're clearly emotionally subnormal.
10. Kill an animal
A bird, a fish, a terminally ill family pet.
11. Drive a sports car extremely fast while wearing sunglasses
Get it out of your system before the grey hairs appear.
12. Lose a week's wages in a casino
13. Make your first million
Wishful thinking, perhaps, but if you plan to be seriously rich, it's good to start early.
14. Have a pregnancy scare
An important part of the emotional maturing process.
15. Have a one-night stand
16. Have an office romance
17. Have sex somewhere peculiar
Aeroplane lavatory, boss's desk, pod on the London Eye, the central hall of Tate Modern ...
18. Be naked in public
Streaking, skinny-dipping or just simple forgetfulness.
19. Have, at the very least, a flirtation with a minor celebrity
It's important to be able to point at the television screen and say: "I've snogged him/her."
20. Take a "work-break" to find yourself ...
Before succumbing to a life of soul-eroding wage slavery.
21. Have a quarter-life crisis
Something deeply menial but soul-improving.
23. Be so short of cash you have to sell something
Anything from record collection, family heirloom, kidney, or even to sexual favours.
24. Work your way around Australia
It takes a while, and you can't get a permit to do casual work once you're over 30. Other continents are also acceptable.
25. Grow out of cannabis
Youthful experimentation is all very well, but a fuddled thirty something with a passion for Pink Floyd and a hunger for Frosties is just embarrassing.
26. Get arrested
For a minor offence, obviously: something like disturbing the peace, which suggests you're not a terminal conformist. At the very least, you should have been breathalysed.
27. Get a tattoo
Absurd if you're getting one if you're over 30.
28. Start your own dotcom
... and see it fail. You'll have a chance to bounce back into a proper job.
29. Drink yourself unconscious
And wake up with only the haziest, shabbiest memories of the night before.
30. Have embarrassing photographs of you posted on a website by friends
...
...
...
[ok, am now making mental note to myself......]
